Friday, January 14, 2005

I don't know what it is about these things that makes them irresistible...
Is it the shiny glaze, which is often a dainty baby pink (but in this case is cappuccino-hued)?
The buttercream layered between slices of cake?
The cute size, only one or two bites big?
The complete nightmare they are to make?
I don't even mind the absurd attention to detail they require.
When I see them gleaming up at me, it is worth everything.
The fact that most people find them kind of "tacky" and "way too sweet" doesn't deter me.
I love them.
If I had daughters, I would make these for their tea time (and for their dolls, too).

Judith Herman and Marguerite Shalett Herman, The Cornucopia, Being a Kitchen Entertainment and Cookbook Containing Good Reading and Good Cookery From More Than 500 Years of Recipes, Food Lore &c. as Conceived and Expounded by the Great Chefs & Gourmets of the Old and New Worlds Between the Years 1390 and 1899 Now Compiled and Presented to the Public in a Single Handsome and Convenient Volume